Casino Players Manipulate Slots in Their Favor

Written by Haylie | Tuesday, October 27th, 2009

An interesting story comes out of a Pennsylvania casino recently when three casino patrons were charged in cheating the slots. How, might you ask, could anyone possibly cheat at slots? One would expect these games that payout based on a random number generator to be nothing less than a fortress. However, at the Meadows Racetrack and Casino, outside of Pittsburgh, three players allegedly found a way to steal from the slots.

A loophole in the game’s security allowed the accused parties to profit at least 60 jackpots dishonestly, winning $429,000 over the course of two months once they discovered a flaw in the gaming software used by the facility. And to make the story even more interesting, one of the accused just happens to be an ex-cop.

Meadows Casino spokesman, David La Torre, suggested that the arrests made in the case are an indication of the congruent combined security efforts of the casino security and the local police force. The two institutions were able to work together to prove there was in fact a crime being committed and then detain the suspects. Furthermore, La Torre has confirmed that the software glitch has been rectified, but more investigations on other games will be evaluated to prevent this from happening again.

The exact way in which these cheaters made the machines payout is nothing less than interesting. The high-roller slots that they were swindling cash out of had a feature that allowed players the opportunity to double up on their winnings. When the user inputted a complex sequence of buttons, an error in the game’s computer program would trigger a payout regardless of what the actual gaming interface was showing. The mastermind of the scheme is reportedly, Andre Nestor, age 37, who was joined by his roommates, Kerry Laverde, 49, and Patrick Loushil, 42. Apparently Nestor had been surviving off government assistance for 15 years while the other two worked low-pay jobs.

Computerized slot expert, Ralph Witherspoon (Witherspoon Security Consulting), explained that the con artists understood how the slots worked and were able to rig them to payout in their favor to payout more often than the odds would otherwise allow. Witherspoon also pointed the finger at the slot game developer, explaining that machines that could be manipulated so easily should have never been sold.